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Meanwile, if anyone could sum up all the steps that I would need to take to remove a faction (preferably with the combination of the server and ICE versions found in downloads), I would be grateful...

So far, I know how to find faction-specific entries based on specific presdefs and I also found out there are two constructors that do not have faction-specific pre, but are linked-to from a faction specific ship instead (originally, I went through the entries one by one and examined them for faction-specific traits).

Like I said, I think I managed to turn down all faction-specific stuff into five entries (Faction itself, Garrison and Starbase stations, Garrison Constructor drone and Lifepod), and the server manages to load the core (so far, I wasn't even testing it's crashing on joining).

I would understand if there were problems if I deleted just one of them, but the core fails to load even if I delete all of them and there shouldn't be anything that points to anything faction-specific left, unless there is some hidden or just less-than-obvious entry or something hidden somewhere...

Like some sort of faction list, that errors if the current number doesn't match some value defined elsewhere (sort of like cores.txt, ranks.txt and maps.txt, where the amount of entries has to match the number at the beginning)...

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(Also, out of sheer curiosity, I tried to do nothing else but duplicating one faction entry and rename it to tell it apart and then gave it a go, only to reach the same result - failure to load the core with the server... Not that I expected a positive result, but it made me wonder... I mean, all the difference it should make is that there would be one more option in the faction selection menu, and it should work just fine as everything points to things that definitely exist... And since you can have a devel that upgrades two different ships - I've done this with SR scout and regular scout both being upgraded to Adv versions by a single devel - then any two things pointing to some other thing common to both of them shouldn't rise any trouble... yet reality has proven me otherwise...)

Jersy wrote:QUOTE (Jersy @ Feb 5 2011, 06:05 AM) Please understand, that this was no "Hey, I don't like Belters, let's delete them and call the result My_Superawesome_Core". I am trying to learn my way around ICE. I started with simple things as adding my own gun, changing rixian scout the way it is in zone_core (SR scout is default rix scout for free) to the model in CC (Rix has non-SR scout for free and SR scout for money) and adding new part with a new devel as it's prerequirement.

Now, I wanted to try to delete a faction.

By that time I knew, that if I leave there something pointing to something that does not exist, it will make problems. That's why I tried to first identify everything that has something to do with said faction and delete said everything.

I thought I thought of everything - All the faction specific ships, stations, devels, drones, parts and even the faction entry itself got deleted. No matter how hard I looked, there was nothing left of that faction.

The process was quite long, so it was in a no way some impulsive action - I took it seriously.

And nowhere in this thread have you mentioned taking such steps. Its good to know you aren't just taking the monkey with a hammer approach but since you're still having problems then there's still something you're missing. Edit: And I am assuming that you've got your server configured properly. I can't remember all the issues with that, but if you've followed the guide on the wiki and can load CC_10 or some other current core then it should be fine.

Also: By starting from scratch I don't mean with MS 1.25. I mean tossing out the new file you've made, getting 1.25 again (or whatever core you're using) and starting from the beginning. Prime example: When I first compiled CC_08 I missed a step and had to spend an entire night recompiling all the changes again based off of CC_07. There are cases where a core you've made is not salvageable and must (or at least, should) be remade from the starting point. For posterity: The problem was when we removed heavy booster, I forgot to go in and remove hvy boost from both the default loadout and the mask (usable equipment) lists on advanced fighters before deleting the actual hvy booster part. The result was it crashed because the game was trying to find a part & mask that no longer existed, and the safest route was to go remake everything from scratch and do it properly. I might've been able to workaround the problem and not have to re-do the changes, but I felt that would just leave problems down the road. Not many people have noticed, but I spent about 4 releases (cc 6 through 10) cleaning up old parts, rewriting old ship/part/etc descriptions, and optimizing the available defs for the express purpose of fixing these kinds of potential problems for future core devs.

QUOTE So please, either take me seriously and try to help me, or don't let yourself be bothered by reacting to anything I write here at all.[/quote]So I suppose that checklist I just gave you of things to make sure aren't missing from the core isn't helpful. Amusing because I would've loved something like that when I was teaching myself ICE. Maybe you're right, if you're just going to complain that giving you things to look for isn't helping then I might as well just sit back and laugh at you instead. It doesn't make any difference to me.

Jersy wrote:QUOTE (Jersy @ Feb 5 2011, 04:05 PM) Like some sort of faction list, that errors if the current number doesn't match some value defined elsewhere (sort of like cores.txt, ranks.txt and maps.txt, where the amount of entries has to match the number at the beginning)...

There is no faction list or size check or anything hidden like that. The core will sink or float on its own, the only exception to this being if any artwork it uses is missing from the artwork folder. That doesn't always cause a crash on startup, but it will cause a crash when playing.

I apologize if that seemed rude, but I was a bit insulted that you just jumped to a conclusion and assumed that I was just randomly going around in ICE and deleting entries at random. As for your list:

Xeretov wrote:QUOTE (Xeretov @ Feb 5 2011, 10:51 AM) The faction entries have lifepods and starting bases that they have to find.
Parts, bases and ships have successors that they have to find.
Ships have items in their default loadouts that they have to find.
They also have part mask sets that they have to find.
The core itself has artwork it has to find.
And the game has to be able to find that core and the artwork inside the artwork folder.

If it was just the list itself, it would be okay and I would thank you, but in combination with the rest of the post, it seemed to me like "WTF noob, check for the basics, duh...".

I also originally wanted to include a reply concerning the individual points in the list in my previous post, but somehow I decided against it... Well, I might as well do it now:

1. The faction entries have lifepods and starting bases that they have to find.
- I reached a state when neither of those (nor anything else faction specific I could find) were present, and it didn't work.

2. Parts, bases and ships have successors that they have to find.
- In the abovementioned state, there were neither of those present, their successors included.

3. Ships have items in their default loadouts that they have to find.
- In abovementioned state, there were no ships of that faction left.

4. They also have part mask sets that they have to find.
- See 3.

5. The core itself has artwork it has to find.
- There is no problem with the path to the artwork, nor have I fiddled with artwork filenames in any way.

6. And the game has to be able to find that core and the artwork inside the artwork folder.
- The core and the artwork files were all there.

To be fair, points 3. and 4. certainly have some value as general ICE tips for me. However, in given situation where there was nothing left of the faction, I couldn't see how it could help me solve my problem.

As for the other points... 1. I figured the hard way in this very experiment (when I managed to delete anything but lifepod, garrison, starbase and related constructor, it was kind of obvious that those are somehow critical). Number 2 I kind of figured out of common sense... When I was adding a new ship by duplicating a basic scout, I noticed the successor window and just to be on the safe side entered -1 in there, and from that point I am aware of the successor and all the other "Green arrow button" relations. Number 5. and 6. were kind of obvious to me from the earliest of my experiments, when I realized that I will need to have my game artwork and server artwork synchronized. From that, I kind of knew that looking for something that does not exist is not amongst the things that allegiance likes.

Once again, I apologize if my reaction seemed rude - I consider it a resolved matter now.

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1. Loading cc_10:
- Yes, cc_10 / 11 / 11b all load just fine

2. Well, then the number of factions itself doesn't seem to be a problem...

Still, I am quite curious where the problem arises after something as simple as duplicating one faction... From what I know so far, two factions sharing the same entries and presdefs shouldn't be problematic (they already do share a lot of them)... Maybe if I managed to identify that problem, it would help me in the opposite approach of removing a faction...

EDIT:

Out of sheer curiosity, I tried to duplicate a faction, and delete the original. The purpose was to test whether there is some problem with two factions using the same entries and presdefs... Once again, failure to load the core. I cannot think about anything that might be wrong - the entries are duplicates and for all intents and purposes should be identical. The only thing they differ in is UID (or is that the problem??? EDIT: No... I reduplicated IC until the entry had UID of 25 - the UID of the original IC - and then I deleted all the other duplicates, and it still didn't work)...

If I had to guess I would say that the current version of ICE is doing something with the factions that the current version of the server doesn't like...

I'll try to experiment with different versions of ICE, see if there is any difference.

Breakthrough, I'd say... I used ICE 341 to duplicate Iron Coalition and the result was loadable by the server.

EDIT:

Few seconds later, I successfully joined the game and launched in a scout flying for "Iron Coalition 2".

I shall now continue in my attempts to remove a faction. Wish me luck.

Jersy wrote:QUOTE (Jersy @ Feb 6 2011, 05:40 AM) I used ICE 341 to duplicate Iron Coalition and the result was loadable by the server.

Ahh yeah, 3.41 was the last tested & stable version of ICE as far as I know. 3.42 and up were released relatively recently (last year) but had some bugs in them. Especially when it came to duplication if I'm not mistaken. I'm not sure if the most recent version is bug free or not as I never got around to making any cores on it.

I can tell you that I never compiled an official release with anything but 3.41 though. The possibility that you might be using a newer version of ICE hadn't even occurred to me. I'd definitely suggest sticking to the older, stable version for learning your way through the program. Afterwards you can experiment with the newer versions and see if they still have problems in them.

Oh and make sure you save often. IIRC there is one small issue in 3.41 in that if you try to go to a particle or successor via the green buttons and that item doesn't exist, ICE will crash on you. I lost a nearly finished release learning that one the hard way.

Xeretov wrote:QUOTE (Xeretov @ Feb 5 2011, 10:48 PM) The problem was when we removed heavy booster, I forgot to go in and remove hvy boost from both the default loadout and the mask (usable equipment) lists on advanced fighters before deleting the actual hvy booster part.

Does this mean that the order in which things are done matters?
(removing from default loadout and usage mask and then deleting booster part != deleting booster part and then removing from default loadout and usage mask? )

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EDIT:

Removing a faction still proves to be a challenge... Let's try a slightly different approach...

EDIT:

Okay... I can remove a techpath. Tested it on Shipyard. It took some entryhunting, but every single shipyard thing got deleted and the result is loadable and doesn't crash the server.

EDIT:

Removing Supremacy proved to be a bit trickier. After first attempt I realized that there is probably some successor problem, so I fixed successors. After second attempt, sudden inspiration told me to check treasures. After removing all "unknown parts" in there, it started working.

EDIT:

Removing Tactical and Expansion turned out to be without any problems and went smoothly on the first try. Thus a core file with worktitle "GarrCore" was born. It should be easier to work with during faction removal experiments.

Jersy wrote:QUOTE (Jersy @ Feb 6 2011, 07:35 AM) Does this mean that the order in which things are done matters?

From what I found, only when deleting actual ship parts. This means guns, boosters, mines, missiles, etc. What I think is happening is that the ship entry is still calling for "part #222" in its default loadout or "mask 3B" in the sets it can equip. But the interface in ICE doesn't allow you to remove that call unless the part still exists or the mask has something in it. So if you were to say, delete quickfires, your safest bet would be to remove QF from any ships that have it in the default loadout and also remove the ability for those ships to mount it. Then delete the actual missile.

I'm not 100% sure the masks cause a problem, but the default loadout definitely does. Doing it the above way might be more tedious than necessary but it will avoid problems later on. By this I mean, if you left "mask B" active on scouts even though there's nothing in it now, and then a year later put a new missile into mask B then all scouts will suddenly mount the new missile. That can be a confusing thing, especially if the new item is something like a long range anti-base missile that your scouts are now firing.

Unrelated:

What purpose serves the "quantity" value at "Ammo Pack" and "Booster Fuel" entries? Tested them on ammo - tried to change the values, but it doesn't seem to have any effect on the amount of ammo that a ship can carry (it's cored separately for each ship anyway), and my test subject - (t)rusty scout, fired it's gat for one and a half minute both while the quantity was 1000 and 100...

The only effect I managed to procure while changing this value was a server crash when I tried to set it to 1...

EDIT:

Masks and default loadouts: Indeed, that seems to support my partially formed conclusions ;-)

EDIT:

Out of curiosity, I went and tested the behavior of usage masks, and it would seem they are rather smart - in my experiment, I duplicated MRM Seeker 1 (changed the name to Seeker 0, removed successor) and gave it the "A" usage mask. Then I went to scout entry and enabled the usage of Seeker 0. Then I directly deleted the Seeker 0 entry, and instead, I duplicated Dumbfire 1 and repeated the rest of the procedure. When I checked the scout, Dumbfire 0 was nowhere to be found.

Conclusion: Usage mask with all it's parts deleted becomes disabled, and has to be enabled again after new parts are added to it.

Today, something curious has happened... I opened GarrCore and was thinking about messing around with it a bit, maybe try to get that "Wingman" combat drone working as a buyable drone... So I took a look on miner's presdefs for some insight on drone mechanism... And there I found kind of weird that pre 19 is not defined by anything... So I typed 19 into the predef box, and to my astonishment, found out that it is Gigacorp specific pre. I looked closer, and indeed, Gigacorp was gone.

There is no Gigacorp in GarrCore. And it works.

I can't believe it. Something I was trying for days now to achieve on purpose, got somehow achieved by some random misclick... And of course, I have no idea what misclick that was...

Either that... Or my computer really has artificial intelligence... I knew that those factory built-in non-removable Vistas I decided to bury beneath XPs would somehow manage to influent the outsides of their prison... Especially when I let the computer run overnight, so they can act while no one is watching... Luckily enough, in this case, they would seem to be actually friendly... (or is it just a devious plot to earn my trust???)

Wow.

Systematic job: 0
Odd twists of fate: 1

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EDIT: Lol, who would have guessed that factions are not only different in-game but also in in-core behavior...

Belters: Deleting causes the server being unable to load the core
Bios: Can be deleted and the following core is loadable without any problems
Gigacorp: Can be deleted and the following core is loadable without any problems
Iron Coalition: Deleting causes the server being unable to load the core
Rixian: Deleting causes crash at the attempt to join the game

This gotta be some sort of CoreDEV inside joke...

Odd twist of fate FTW.

Look guys alleg is same as real life